scholarly journals The Antwerpian Printer Jacob van Liesvelt, his Widow, and their Bibles: Myths and Facts from a Confessional Era

2020 ◽  
Vol 89 (4) ◽  
pp. 779-800
Author(s):  
Wim François
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Word Of God ◽  
History Writing ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Bible ◽  
American Scholar

Jacob van Liesvelt, an Antwerpian printer, was executed in 1545 for publishing without the consent of the authorities. His sad story has been retold throughout the centuries. In an early Protestant tradition, it was argued that Van Liesvelt died because of certain Reformation-minded marginal notes contained in the Bible of 1542, an argument that has been continuously elaborated upon over the years, giving rise to the myth of Van Liesvelt as the martyr of the Word of God. This article critically questions the story of Van Liesvelt's execution, showing ways to “debunk” the myth. However, in her book Pragmatic Toleration (2015), the American scholar Victoria Christman reworks a theory earlier put forward in an article in The Sixteenth Century Journal (2011), building on the Van Liesvelt myth from husband to widow. She argues that the latter, Maria Ancxt, simply continued her husband's Protestant Bible production, uninhibited by his terrifying fate and without experiencing any form of judicial censure. This essay, in contrast, presents a painstaking study of Ancxt's entire Bible production, which firmly arrives at the conclusion that it was largely Catholic in character—although Ancxt explored the boundaries of what was possible—and that this is the reason why she was never disturbed by the authorities. This essay, therefore, also includes more general remarks on confessionally or ideologically colored history writing—in the past and present—while exploring its boundaries.

Who Compiled the Sixteenth-Century Patristic Handbook Unio Dissidentium?

1965 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 237-250 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Peters
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Literary History ◽  
Original Sin ◽  
Word Of God ◽  
Infant Baptism ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Bible ◽  
High Level ◽  
And Function

The purpose of this paper is to raise a problem of more than antiquarian interest in Reformation literary history. The Unio Dissidentium is a collection of passages from the Bible together with nearly 550 quotations, many of them quite lengthy, from the Fathers. This latter feature gives to the book much of its interest, as well as a place in the patristic revival begun by the classical humanists and brought to a high level of development by the work of such men as Erasmus and Beatus Rhenanus.So far as can with certainty be stated, the first part of Unio Dissidentium was published by the Antwerp printer, Martin de Keyser, in March 1527. The ten sections into which it is divided contain passages supporting the compiler’s theology on such current theological issues as original sin, infant baptism, predestination, the nature and function of law, grace and merit, faith and works, and human ordinances. Later that same year the same printer published the second part, dealing with the value of the Word of God, penitence, brotherly correction, fasting, prayer, indulgences, the Eucharist, ecclesiastical constitutions, the vocation of all Christians to be priests, kings, and prophets, and antichrist. To the editions printed in and after 1531 a further three sections were added, the first two of which are on expensive funerals and the flight and persecution of Christians, respectively, while the third is the tract of Pseudo-Augustine, De Essentia Divinitatis.

scholarly journals Die Woord van God by Luther

1998 ◽  
Vol 54 (1/2) ◽  
Author(s):  
J. W.C. Van Wyk
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Martin Luther ◽  
Word Of God ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Historical Developments ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Law And Gospel

Luther's understanding of the Word of God. This paper attempts to show that Martin Luther is much more than a great personality from the past. He is in fact an important theological father of the Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk. Our theology must be understood from the perspective of Luther's theology. A call is also made that theologians from the Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk not turn their backs on Luther. This paper concentrates on Luther's understand-ing of the Word of God. It gives perspectives on historical developments in Luther's theology. It also disCusses the following themes: the Bible as the Word of God, the relationship between Old and New Testament, the relationship between law and gospel, the position of the pope and the role of experience in understanding the Word of God.

scholarly journals Kenteoretiese besinning oor teologiebeoefening aan die Teologiese Skool van Potchefstroom die afgelope twintig jaar

1992 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
G. Snyman
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Word Of God ◽  
Naive Realism ◽  
Founding Father ◽  
Naïve Realism ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Theological School

In commemoration of the death a hundred years ago of Dirk Postma, the founding father of the Gereformeerde Kerke in South Africa, this article focuses on the theological creativity of the past twenty years at the Theological School in Potchefstroom. Theological creativity in the GKSA should be viewed in the light of a fear of humanism, horizontalism and secularism. In the churches' zealousness to treat the Bible as the Word of God, in order to be able to say 'Thus says the Lord God’, the need to reflect on the recipients' epistemological presuppositions is not felt. Consequently, Neoplatonism, Positivism and Naive Realism found their way into the theological activity of the TSP. A lack of such reflection on these epistemological presuppositions creates the possibility of projecting them back into the Bible and then investing them with revelational authority.

scholarly journals Hervormde hermeneutiese perspektiewe op Skrifverstaan en die Nuwe Testament

2017 ◽  
Vol 73 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Piet A. Geyser
Keyword(s):  
Special Reference ◽  
New Testament ◽  
Word Of God ◽  
Scientific Methods ◽  
The Past ◽  
Reformed Church ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Basic Tenet ◽  
The World ◽  
The New Testament

This article reflects on hermeneutics in the widest sense of the concept and not on the detailed technicalities from philosophical and other perspectives. Hermeneutics will be taken to refer to the whole act and process of understanding. It is done with special reference to how the understanding of Scripture and specifically the New Testament of theologians of the Netherdutch Reformed Church over the past seven decades, is reflected in the work in the HTS Theological Studies journal. It is clear that their approach to the understanding and concretisation of the message of the New Testament was one of greatest respect for Scripture. The basic tenet throughout was that the Word of God was to be found in the Bible. There was no assumption that Bible and Word of God were identified on one and the same level. Taking the Bible as literature seriously implied that the best scientific methods had to be found and implemented in this search for the meaning of the Word of God for the Church’s message and practice in the world.

Enlightening Symbols

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Mazur
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Number System ◽  
Psychological Effects ◽  
Mathematical Notation ◽  
Rhetorical Style ◽  
The Past ◽  
Mathematical Symbols ◽  
Before And After ◽  
New Ideas ◽  
Different Cultures

While all of us regularly use basic mathematical symbols such as those for plus, minus, and equals, few of us know that many of these symbols weren't available before the sixteenth century. What did mathematicians rely on for their work before then? And how did mathematical notations evolve into what we know today? This book explains the fascinating history behind the development of our mathematical notation system. It shows how symbols were used initially, how one symbol replaced another over time, and how written math was conveyed before and after symbols became widely adopted. Traversing mathematical history and the foundations of numerals in different cultures, the book looks at how historians have disagreed over the origins of the number system for the past two centuries. It follows the transfigurations of algebra from a rhetorical style to a symbolic one, demonstrating that most algebra before the sixteenth century was written in prose or in verse employing the written names of numerals. It also investigates the subconscious and psychological effects that mathematical symbols have had on mathematical thought, moods, meaning, communication, and comprehension. It considers how these symbols influence us (through similarity, association, identity, resemblance, and repeated imagery), how they lead to new ideas by subconscious associations, how they make connections between experience and the unknown, and how they contribute to the communication of basic mathematics. From words to abbreviations to symbols, this book shows how math evolved to the familiar forms we use today.

From Black Death to Black Hole

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcin Piatkowski
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Black Hole ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Black Death ◽  
European Continent ◽  
The Past

In this chapter I explain why Poland and most countries in Eastern Europe have always lagged behind Western Europe in economic development. I discuss why in the past the European continent split into two parts and how Western and Eastern Europe followed starkly different developmental paths. I then demonstrate how Polish oligarchic elites built extractive institutions and how they adopted ideologies, cultures, and values, which undermined development from the late sixteenth century to 1939. I also describe how the elites created a libertarian country without taxes, state capacity, and rule of law, and how this ‘golden freedom’ led to Poland’s collapse and disappearance from the map of Europe in 1795. I argue that Polish extractive society was so well established that it could not reform itself from the inside. It was like a black hole, where the force of gravity is so strong that the light could not come out.

The Invention of Papal History

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Bauer
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Reformation ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Historical Texts ◽  
The Past ◽  
History Of ◽  
Cultural Standards ◽  
Commissioned Works ◽  
The One ◽  
Late Renaissance ◽  
The Church

How was the history of post-classical Rome and of the Church written in the Catholic Reformation? Historical texts composed in Rome at this time have been considered secondary to the city’s significance for the history of art. The Invention of Papal History corrects this distorting emphasis and shows how history-writing became part of a comprehensive formation of the image and self-perception of the papacy. By presenting and fully contextualizing the path-breaking works of the Augustinian historian Onofrio Panvinio (1530–68), this book shows what type of historical research was possible in the late Renaissance and the Catholic Reformation. Historiography in this period by no means consisted entirely of commissioned works written for patrons; rather, a creative interplay existed between, on the one hand, the endeavours of authors to explore the past and, on the other hand, the constraints of patronage and ideology placed on them. This book sheds new light on the changing priorities, mentalities, and cultural standards that flourished in the transition from the Renaissance to the Catholic Reformation.

Conclusion: The Bible Human and Divine

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jetze Touber
Keyword(s):  
Word Of God ◽  
Biblical Criticism ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Contested Terrain ◽  
Public Church

The conclusion recapitulates the variegated dynamics at play in the interpretation and use of the Bible in the Dutch Public Church when Spinoza articulated his biblical criticism. Spinoza’s Tractatus theologico-politicus did not suddenly open the eyes of his contemporaries to the technical and philosophical problems of identifying a text with the Word of God. Rather it arrived at an extremely delicate moment, when forces from various directions were already contesting one another over the authority to interpret Scripture in their own ways. These forces had their own momentum when refuting Spinoza’s outlandish appeal to biblical philology, and responded in turn to one another inlight of the new reality. In result, by 1700 the space allowed for exegetical variety within the doctrinal enclosure of the Public Church had gradually widened, but it remained a contested terrain where innovations were easily considered, or branded, harmful to ecclesiastical unity.

Vietnamese Historical Writing

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patricia Pelley
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
East Asian ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Southern State ◽  
The Past ◽  
South Vietnam ◽  
Political Function ◽  
Different Types ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
North Vietnam

This chapter demonstrates how the process of decolonization and the ensuing separation of Vietnam into a northern and southern state as part of the Cold War in Asia led to different types of history-writing. In both Vietnamese regimes, the writing of history had to serve the state, and in both countries historians emphasized its political function. Whereas North Vietnam located itself in an East Asian and Marxist context, historians of South Vietnam positioned it within a Southeast Asian setting and took a determinedly anti-communist position. After 1986—over a decade after reunification—with past tensions now relaxed, the past could be revaluated more openly under a reformist Vietnamese government that now also permitted much greater interaction with foreign historians.

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